s the reader tobelieve with him.The second essay by Sidney Hook is a critical of Howard Zinnsessay. Hook is a much better writer than Zinn. Hook is able to point out allof Zinns faults with his essay. Hook does show where Zinn messed upwhen he was saying what was the definition of democracy. Zinns faultwas that he tries to define democracy but uses to different forms of the wordin his essay. Hook also shows another error in Zinns essay where Zinnsays that democracy can be measured by comparing it to an ideal. Theproblem with this is that Zinn never gives us what the ideal is to comparehow strong is democracy. Zinn wants equality to all men and women in hisdemocratic society when in fact to truly get equality some people like thesick, elderly, and children need more power. In Hooks eyes we couldnever reach the kind of equality that Zinn is looking for even if our societywas that of classless. Hook says the only true way of determining howdemocratic is a nation is by comparison. Society must look at the past anddetermine if they are giving more equality than before and how they canhave more equality for the future. In this essay by Hook he comes across asa better writer. It is harder to criticize one persons work and state proofand details to back up your statement than it is to just make up your ownopinions and constantly just spitting out statements that help to support youridea. To me Hook seems to be the one with more insight on this topic. He countersevery point made by Zinn by showing in Zinns own writing where hecontradicts himself and Hook also makes some strong statements andopinions of his own that help persuade me to believe in what Hook has tosay.I believe that if you use Zinns definition of democracy one whichthat is modeled after the way our founding fathers have set up our nationsgovernment of course we are democratic. In reality that is not the way weshould view our democracy. It is system of government tha...
